The last essay I wrote can be summed up in a sentence: measurement won’t tell you anything unless you know what you’re measuring and why you’re measuring it. This seems obvious and reasonable, which is why it invariably attracts criticism.

There are two bad responses and one good:

“We teach this in 101, you’re not saying anything new.” On the contrary, I’d have no reason to write any of this without the catastrophe of modern academia. Anyone remotely invested in the advancement of human knowledge and/or the use of that knowledge should be screaming right now.

“It’s the fault of media.” This is partially true, inasmuch as the media picks and chooses and can’t read a study to save its life, but even a good review of the evidence would be bad because the evidence is bad.

The more interesting, approximating a comment so as not to put anyone on blast: “Numbers – even imperfect approximations of qualitative judgments – are still a helpful tool for making judgments. For instance, APGAR scores rely on some degree of qualitative opinion enumerated, but they have a definite use and it would be bad to lose them. You’re overplaying your hand by attacking them as inherently bad.”

The US has been classified as a “flawed democracy” by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU)’s Democracy Index for the second year in a row. First, in 2016 (study released 2017), and now 2017 (released 2018). I’m going to privilege year under study and call the first the 2016 report and the second the 2017 report.

The global picture and a bonus briefer on our shortcomings:

Almost one-half (49.3%) of the world’s population lives in a democracy of some sort, although only 4.5% reside in a “full democracy”, down from 8.9% in 2015 as a result of the US being demoted from a “full democracy” to a “flawed democracy” in 2016 (see Democracy Index 2017 by regime type, page 2). Around one-third of the world’s population lives under authoritarian rule, with a large share being in China.

Here’s the report (pdf), methodology at the bottom. The Economist Intelligence Unit’s Democracy Index scores countries between 1-10 based on five factors: electoral process and pluralism; civil liberties; the functioning of government; political participation; and political culture.

You might wonder how one measures any of that, and you would be right to, and I have nothing to offer you but confusion. Apparently, the EIU uses both “public opinion polls” and “experts.” Since I cannot find any information on the specific experts – the website gives me all analysts, the editor of the report, and no further information – I’m guessing this means “some suits + World Values Survey.” No, I am not joking:

A crucial, differentiating aspect of our measure is that, in addition to experts’ assessments, we use, where available, public-opinion surveys—mainly the World Values Survey.

In 2016 the US dropped into the “flawed democracy” category, and this trend continues. You might wonder “dropped how” and the answer is .02 democracies, because as of 2017 we’re a 7.98. No, I have no idea what that means either. According to the report, we’d been teetering on the edge for a while due to low confidence in institutions, and that finally pushed us over.

This is presumably a worrying trend or something, although I have no idea what it’s a trend of. Still, it’s a relatively minor fall with many causes and we should probably keep our heads cool. It’s worth noting that if we were downgraded due to trust in the system, inaccurately reporting that the US government is no longer democratic probably isn’t the best way to rectify that.

If you want to be a philosopher about it, the problem is being vs. becoming, Heraclitus’ Fire and Flux vs. Parmenides’ Oneness and Rest. Plato unites these, so the story goes. This isn’t exactly true, but it’s close enough: the very highest things are Being, so eternal, and the very top of that is the Form of the Good. The lower things of this world are becoming – shadows in the cave – but they partake in Being via the forms. Man has two natures – flesh and soul – flesh is becoming and soul is being. The best human life, then, is one that partakes in the eternal, and especially in the form of the good. Normally, this is just called “Truth.” It’s important that this work in a particular way: if there is no access to being, then all our knowledge is shadow and wind. This worked out very well for us for a time, truth was a fine friend, it even gave us a God or two for when the nights were particularly nocturnal.

Then the first problem: Truth unsettles everything around it. Empiricism is a very effective way to pursue our ideals, and it pursues them right off a cliff. Turns out there is no metaphysical ground, atoms in a void, many worlds in the multiverse and the You in each of them is terrified and confused. Theoretically, you were supposed to find a sobering and harmonious universe. What you find is a teenage goth’s wildest fantasies: there is no heaven, there is no God, there is no meaning, morality is arbitrary, justice is the will of the stronger, humans are self-deceiving moral monsters, fuck it, I’ll be a gnat next life. But you can’t just lie, that’s still wrong for poorly understood reasons, we can’t go back.

We want a reason to exist, so that’s a bummer, but not really the end of the world. I guess you can just mope or something, Siouxsie was pretty cool. So you Phil 101: “Humans determine their own meaning.” Blatantly untrue if you’ve talked to one, but I understand the significance of the words. It’s a subjective phenomenon, we are subjects, maybe meaning [static and wails]. I don’t even disagree, I just don’t think you understand. Not only did you not make that choice, it’s not even the right one. “How wondrous to exist and Sisyphus really digging the struggle,” is no meaning at all, it’s too abstract, it’s both flabby and hollow at once, it’s only possible for a weakling to raise it because it’s so empty. Everyone wants “good things” and is quite sure that “good things” are rather important. Does that help us coordinate for the specific goods we want?

Here’s your second problem: Truth unsettles itself. What truth does find doesn’t look much like its first mandate. Not only are there no Platonic Forms, there’s nothing that even resembles objective truth. The human mind evolved to lie to itself, to interpret according to experience, but even checking experience against experience is merely the best approximation of a human experience. It may be our best interpretation, but scientific truth isjust an interpretation conditioned by the creature experiencing it. No, sadly, there aren’t better ones. Trust me, I’ve looked. Without Platonism you’re screwed for the deep deep grounding. This should change something maybe, if there’s no moral purpose and Truth is just an interpretation then why not discard it for happiness? Deepak Chopra seems like he has a pleasant outlook – I imagine it’s much like thought thinking itself through a lukewarm bath. That it’s “wrong” is no count against it if you can’t justify your own truths, but you still can’t seem to lie to yourself.

Good instinct. But also why silent black screen, slow rise of a single note, cigarette-voice: Their ideals had begun to turn on them.

Here’s your third problem: it is hard to be a creature of becoming that understands being. We judge ourselves by unrealistic standards. “Understands.” Now you know that’s a ridiculous problem to have, an artifact of evolution, just some cave-man shit. Does that make it go away? It’s the thought of it that hurts, not its reality. Zeus isn’t real either but it’s the reason you understand why Homer made Zeus judge: “Of all the living creatures, man is the most wretched.” You are a creature that has some notion of ephemerality, some desire to be more-than-that, and finally the knowledge that this is impossible. Eat up. Continue reading “Everything is Going According to Plan”

SSC writes a response to The Good Guy/Bad Guy Myth by Catherine Nichols. Nichols’ piece claims that good vs. evil stories are distinctly modern, older tales were more ambiguous, this was a causal factor for modern nationalism and subsequent atrocities.

On one hand, I don’t want to look a gift-horse in the mouth. I’m in favor of Old Books, they are indeed complex, thanks for the backup. Nichols’ underlying premise is worthwhile: a) Myths and epics and fairy-tales have a moral complexity and ambiguity we casually ignore; b) There has been a genuine shift in values, and while Christianity was part of it, the after-effects of the industrial revolution are much more relevant for our current society.

On the other, I agree with Scott’s criticisms. The historical argument presented is wild. The Spanish conquered most of the Americas between the 16th and 17th centuries under the pretense of moral ineptitude and evil among the natives. They had to be forced into enlightenment, which meant murder, torture, and slavery. Bartoleme de las Casas is considered more rhetorical than accurate, but he says some true things. Here’s his book A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies: there’s a lot about feeding people to dogs and slaughtering children for fun, sometimes both at once.

Then again, maybe the Spanish were just early adopters. Pierre Menard (PDF) or Miguel Cervantes wrote a book about simplistic values in literature causing illusory political actions way back in 1604:

And so, having completed these preparations, he did not wish to wait any longer to put his thought into effect, impelled by the great need in the world that he believed was caused by his delay, for there were evils to undo, wrongs to right, injustices to correct, abuses to ameliorate, and offenses to rectify. And one morning before dawn on a hot day in July, without informing a single person of his intentions, and without anyone seeing him, he armed himself with all his armor and mounted Rocinante, wearing his poorly constructed helmet, and he grasped his shield and took up his lance and through the side door of a corral he rode out into the countryside with great joy and delight at seeing how easily he had given a beginning to his virtuous desire.

The Aeon piece is factually incorrect, its timing is screwy, fine. That’s not my problem. The essay set off a very particular panic point for me.

In making the case that we have a simplistic good/evil binary, it set up its own – nationalist/liberal, politically bad/politically good, whatever you want to call it. Nazi references rule everything, it was not subtle. It argues against art as a tool for training moral values – which I happen to agree with – but makes it, instead, a political tool. Not that she wants that, because she doesn’t, but that it can do that, and thus that art which does such a thing is bad art.

Like this:

Pythagoras assigned cyclical motions to the planets. Circles are eternal, and thus the motion most suited for the motions of the heavens. This essay is about circles, as well, albeit the more homely human kind. It’s about racing so far in one direction that you wind up back at the get-go.

All theories have assumptions, all assumptions lead to their own conclusions. Inconsistency is not bad for the sin of pride, it’s bad because it makes you wreck yourself in conversations. Worse is inconsistency with power for reasons that are too obvious to lay out, [Goya etching here], etc.

This blog has recently been focused on the epistemology of mathematics. It has interesting and far-reaching consequences, but it’s often ignored as meaningless specialist nonsense and/or ivory tower shit.

Those consequences are the real interest, and I’ve explicitly stated that the end is modern phenomenology. But to get to [anything modern] you need Kant, to get to Kant you need Hume, to get to Hume you need Idealism, to get Idealism you need Plato.

Platonism (in math) is, essentially, the position that mathematical objects are real. They are as “out there” as a planet is “out there” (just not in space-time, spoiler alert). Because it’s hard to really precise this, here’s (hilariously) an entire appendix of people defining it.

Naive versions of Platonism are astoundingly common when it comes to the epistemology of mathematics. These aren’t “wrong” per se, they just lead to consequences counter to what we tend to want. I’m pretty sure this is because mathematics is secure enough that it’s the very last metaphysical “thing” we want to deny. The denial also leads to tricky questions about the physical sciences, i.e. the point of this series. Thus, we’re a lot more willing to grant ontological primacy to mathematics than we are to, say, “beauty” or “virtue.”

But also: Plato himself is a necessary nightmare to talk about. He’s a great example of why one should read primary sources, because “platonism” is historically sideways. This is bad enough that I have to write two separate articles. This one is on “Platonism.” The next will be on Plato.

When we talk about Platonism now, we’re not actually talking about a 4th century BC philosophical school. We’re talking about a 20th century one. Godel absolutely stomped the early analytic schools, and everyone wandered in a daze looking for a new position. Kind of, this is bad history, don’t @ me. I’m not going to get into that because [long] and [besides the point], but it’s consistent that Godel himself was a devoted Platonist.

It’s quite popular, so note that any criticisms I make will 100% have objections and counter-arguments. Platonism is the plurality position by this survey (PDF) of philosophers. (Q: Abstract objects: Platonism or nominalism? Results: Abstract objects: Platonism 39.3%; nominalism 37.7%; other 23.0%.) Since it says “abstract objects” rather than “mathematical objects”, that probably confounds full-blooded Platonism (“all abstract concepts exist”) with mathematical Platonism (“at least mathematical objects exist”), but I’ve yet to meet someone who thought that the abstract concept “beauty” is real but numbers are not. In other words, that 39.3% almost certainly covers all mathematical Platonists.

If I get around to talking about the analytics (way later), I’m going to have to return to Platonism, i.e. this is incomplete. I’m much more interested in arguments mustered for naturalism on Platonic grounds, both as a personal preference and for subsequent articles. Less in arguing for or against Platonism than in showing some of the consequences, and for those we basically assume it’s true. After all, this series begins with the question: “Why does math work in reality?” and Platonism is an answer to that question. It works because math is real, it doesn’t matter how frail the human mind is, somehow we frailed our way into the Truth of the World, take it and run.

Still, there’s a reason that a shocking number of otherwise-impartial descriptions of modern platonists use phrases like “bite the bullet” to describe their admissions. The consequences of the argument are wild, and for that one actually can turn back to Plato. It matters less whether he himself believed it than it does that he develops some of the results and, even if ironically, these went on to have some super weird consequences.

You might ask why start with Platonism, then. Long story short: [history] happened, modern Platonism is enough like what pre-modern philosophers were responding to that it’s basically fine. There was a long historical bit here, but it’s been banished to an appendix for taking up space without moving the argument forward.

I’ve praised the virtues of careful philosophical argumentation. In an act of stunning hypocrisy, I will now write a very reckless article about Plato and Platonism.

Like this:

Let’s start this with an obvious question: “Why are you so concerned with math?”

It has to be answered for any description to make sense. Looking back, it does appear that my interest is just because of Kant’s interest. No, and:

It’s not good that our root instinct is a lazy Cartesian skepticism, but it does make my job easier. That was something earlier writers had to inflict; it being the default lets us move quicker.

Ask a college kid what Truth capital T is and they’ve already absorbed the right lessons: truth is a construct determined by your culture’s valuations and epistemic suppositions, therefore we’ll never be able to actually arrive at the Truth. “It’s subjective.” Moreover, logic is dependent on language, which is dependent on culture; reason needs categories to manipulate, which are dependent on [relative thing]; trying to interpret the empirical world is a problem because you can never step outside yourself, data isn’t “there,” it must be uncovered, hence the flaws of naive science.

I say this like I’m mocking the arguments, but I do really mean this is the correct way to start. Not only are we in the cave, that cave is in a metacave. Don’t trust yourself to trust the outside world, reason splinters out of a bunch of psychological flaws and biases, inner fickledom influences outer fickledom, there is a great gnashing of teeth.

Nietzsche, who I will quote this once and then avoid until [distant post]:

Once upon a time, in some out of the way corner of that universe which is dispersed into numberless twinkling solar systems, there was a star upon which clever beasts invented knowing. That was the most arrogant and mendacious minute of “world history,” but nevertheless, it was only a minute. After nature had drawn a few breaths, the star cooled and congealed, and the clever beasts had to die.

One might invent such a fable, and yet he still would not have adequately illustrated how miserable, how shadowy and transient, how aimless and arbitrary the human intellect looks within nature.

We should be extremely skeptical that the human intellect can touch on anything True, much less even vaguely functional. I do mean that as a starting point: get as deep into skepticism as you can, or else what follows won’t be as baffling as it should be.

If human reason were worth a damn, there would be no question about the status of math. Only in light of its complete and total vapidity do we realize how baffling it is that Leibniz can think about geometry real hard, Maxwell can apply that hard thinking, and now we have computers. Continue reading “On a Particularly Difficult Question”

It’s something like a condensed version of the Uruk Series, and much shorter than most essays here. (I didn’t ditch this blog for other publications; I’m working on them, more posts here in a few days.)

People coming from Aeon: Hi. Thanks for reading. The Aeon essay is (kind of) a condensed form of a series I wrote here (the index of which is here), and a few odds and ends.

The most relevant pieces are this one on Seeing Like a State, this on Karl Polanyi, and this on gri-gri. All of those are much longer than the Aeon piece (and my tone is less neutral). Eventually it goes into Eric Hoffer, Christopher Lasch, and some other stuff.

I haven’t addressed Nietzsche very explicitly (although I mention him at the end of the series), nor differing conceptions of nihilism. I plan to in the future. Sorry.

At the moment, I’m writing a new series. It’s about Kant and mathematics, and how that leads into early phenomenology. The first post is here. It will likely make people with different philosophical commitments angry.

I feel like people are going to ask this, so: Qohelet’s Ossuary is intended to be a list of quotes pulled from history books. I’ve been bad about updating it.